I think it’s no secret that the relationship I have with my 2010 VW Tiguan, which is my wife’s primary car, has been, um, checkered, at best. I actively like the car, at least when it’s running, because it’s got a pleasant interior and drives well and is a good, not-too-big size, all that. Also, the dash has so many warning lights on it feels like Las Vegas, which always keeps things exciting. Mostly, though, this car has been frustrating as hell with all of the things that have gone wrong, and while that may drain my bank account and frustrate me and torture me with the cavalier attitude so many of this car’s systems have with the concept of “working,” I do have to appreciate the creativity that has been going into some recent issues. Like this most recent one, which I initially thought was caused by squirrels dropping things on the roof. I wish I were kidding.
What makes this problem so mysterious is that, so far, it seems to only happen in one very specific area: my kid’s school bus stop. That bus stop is just a couple of blocks down from my house, down a street, a turn, halfway down that street, and that’s it. My kid walks back from this bus stop every day, but in the mornings, him walking to the bus stop usually meant him missing the bus about, oh, 170% of the time. So, tired of driving him to school, I gave in and started driving him to the stop every morning.
And this is where the problem manifests itself, while we’re sitting in the parked, idling Tiguan at the bus stop. Here’s what happens: everything is fine, and then you hear a loud, booming THWONK. It reverberates throughout the car and somehow sounds like it’s coming from the roof. It sounds like something big and heavy dropped on the roof of the car. At first, I suspected squirrels – my go-to anytime something happens that I need to find blame for – thinking they were dropping acorns or something on the roof. Even if it sounded more like a coconut.
But I never saw any evidence of anything dropped, it wasn’t my kid Otto stamping his feet or punching the roof, it was a complete mystery. This happened over and over, always in that same spot – well, once it also happened in my driveway, but that was pretty much it, every other time the bus stop was the only place the deep, resonant THWONKs showed up.
Eventually, I realized that the THWONKs were coming not from the roof, but from the speakers! And, luckily, this morning it happened again, and I was able to capture the audio! Also, please forgive the pajama pants and bedhead, it was early, so very early:
Hear that? I promise you it’s even louder and more resonant in person. And it really shakes the roof!
Now, as for why this is happening, I think we have some pretty big clues. The first of which is the death of the Tiguan’s head unit, which just recently decided it was tired of all that tedious “functioning” and now is just a black screen that occasionally cycles to the startup screen, then back to black. This is especially a shame since I only realized it can play DVDs about a year ago.
Did I say some pretty big clues? Because that was an exaggeration, I really only have that one. But I think that one is likely enough. Because without a functioning head unit, those speakers don’t really ever have any coherent signal going to them, but I think they’re still pulling their 12V of power, so they’re like your idle hands: the devil will find work for them to do. In this case, the devil may be stray electrical signals of some sort, and the work is just a loud thumping sound?
Now, I realize a bad head unit can certainly cause something like this, but if it was actually just an internal electronic fault causing the speaker thump, wouldn’t it just do it at any time, in any place? Why are these thumps almost exclusive to that one little stretch of road? That’s why I’m wondering if there may be some sort of other RF noise in that area that some of the wiring is picking up, antenna-like, and transferring to the speakers? And if so, can I somehow turn this whole car into a Theremin?
Our publisher Matt asked an interesting question about a possible cause in Slack today:
I know I sorta jumped down his throat there, but that could be a possibility: it’s an RF source that’s very localized and fairly strong. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a dog at the house I’m usually parked in front of, though, but it’s possible the dog is so tired of being zapped by that mysterious invisible fence, the dog just gave up on going outside at all, because fuck that.
But maybe, like that poor electrocuted dog, I’m barking up the wrong tree here? Could there be some other cause? There are no transformers nearby, but there are power lines. I’m sure every house there has wifi and Bluetooth and possibly other devices that do some sort of RF broadcasting. Could it be anything like that? Those signals seem like they’d be a bit low power to cause this, but who the hell knows? And I don’t think it’s the Bluetooth or other RF signals from my phone because, again, if that were the case, it would just happen anywhere.
Right? I’m sort of baffled. If any of you brainiacs out there have some ideas, I’d love to hear them. Or advice for a new head unit to replace this thing, ideally with CarPlay and backup camera input! Because that’d probably just take care of it.
Or, I can just learn to give in to the beat. I feel like I’m already halfway there.
I think electricity has been described to the Germans but that’s the extent of their knowledge
Talk about a banging sound system.
@theRealSaulGoodman? From Block Your Comment /Report?
huh?
Such a sin for Volkswagen to make a vehicle as elegant and handsome as the Tiguan, yet so unreliable.
Got a good laugh out of the article and the problem. Please let us know what solves it, if you ever do!
I use ATOTO headunits typically. They are a nightmare to shop for, but the price to performance ratio is pretty good. My newest one has wireless carplay and android auto. I get em because I like that they are android, so I can do stuff like real time OnX maps, in-car OBDII diagnosis, and youtube for waiting in ferry lines. My newest one has a lovely QLED screen, the ability to run a sim (I don’t, but I like the option), a bunch of camera inputs, decent processor and ram. All for around $250 bucks.
Why do you drive him just a few blocks in anything gas powered when that’s the ideal use case for the Changli?
It’s terrible with Jason’s past issues but all I can think of is this Simpson’s where Homer hears this terrible thumping noise and the Mechanic says it’s his heart and Homer is relieved as he was afraid it was his transmission.
Also definitely would recommend a head unit with carplay or android auto so you can have the waze and voice reading texts and such. There’s actually some slick ones that have the whole console with the front face of the vents and such included and just pop right in.
It’s haunted! One more reason to trade that stupid thing in.
A few days after I bought my old Mountaineer I was sitting at a stop light and heard loud banging like someone was pounding on my rear hatch which startled the crap out of me, but sure enough no one was there. This kept happening randomly until I realized it had a hidden factory subwoofer that had gone bad and would randomly outburst. This led me to replace the sub, amp, and all the speakers along with a Carplay head unit and now it sounds great!
For the head unit recommendation, I’ve been using the Sony XAV-AX1000 in all my cars and its been great. It has a volume knob and front USB slot which most of the aftermarket units don’t have. The oldest one has been running problem free for 5 years now.
I installed one of those Sony units in my Silverado and I love it. I don’t have a crazy sound system in the truck and I don’t need it to be super high tech, but it’s got bluetooth, the volume knob, the USB port for music when I’ve got no signal, it works with the steering wheel controls, and it plugged right into the rear view camera I had already installed from a previous, cheaper head unit. It’s also a reasonable price too, which was nice. Anything cheaper is missing some crucial function (hence the replacement), and anything more expensive is wasted with how loud the truck is.
The Illuminati.
At first it seemed like the intro of Cuando Pase el Temblor.
But that was a Remo Quadura, I think.
Your Tiguan sounds like it’s transforming into a 26×14 6-ply mahogany Ludwig bass drum. Not bad, really. With time you, can channel your inner Bonham.
Downside: you’ll have to put another car for daily use.
If it was a cavalier it would work, perhaps poorly, but it would work. How does the old addage go a cavalier will run poorly longer and most cars will run?
Dude…. just sell it. Its a Volkswagon. Not even a very interesting one. Its just an SUV with VW like problems. Sell it and get something that won’t give you weird ass problems.
Agreed. There are plenty of 2010 smedium sized SUVs that don’t come with VW problems, get one of those!
Didn’t DT buy a Toyota Sienna or something for Torch and drive it half way over the country for him wrenching along the way to replace this troublesome VW?
It’s a heat thing.
It’s happening after the radio heats up and a capacitor is probably discharging.
It happens at the bus stop because of timing. It’s a place you consistently go allowing the predictable behavior.
I bet it always happens, but you can’t tell?
May not notice it while moving, but would notice while sitting at idle.
Seems to me you’re spot on.
Car is haunted by the ghost of John Bonham?
Try pulling the fuse for the head unit and drive to the noise zone.
Correct diagnosis.
I think you are fighting the wrong battle. There is nothing wrong with the VW. You have the perfect get him to the bus on time vehicle in the Rancid Cab. What i mean by that is use that to take him directly to the front of the school everything he misses the school bus( it is already yellow.) For a added benefit use the Cab to advertise your new lighting business that exclusively sell ceiling based ventilation products. Do that for a week and i guarantee he will make the school bus on time in a hurricane.
Bonus points for taking some bolts out of the new cat so everyone hears you showing up.
He’s in anti-vax country. Sending a kid from that cab into a school may as well be a bioweapon attack.
I assure you, Chapel Hill / Carrboro is far from anti-vax country. I’m sure Torch can back me up on that..
A small island of sanity doesn’t negate the surrounding waters.
Growing up I had a back door neighbor with a huge ham radio, like multiple antennas over 20 feet tall huge. Whenever he got on it, we had lights that were touch sensitive that would dim up and down, and my dad’s hifi set would faintly buzz if it wasn’t being used, sometimes you could even hear muffled talking. Not clear enough to make out what was being said, but enough to catch the rhythm of the conversation.
So, it could be that.
“Growing up I had a back door neighbor with a huge ham radio”
That sounds dirty.
I couldn’t tell in the video – do you put your four-way hazard flashers on while waiting for the bus? The rhythm seems like the same tempo as blinkers. Perhaps there’s some sort of fault that’s only occurring when you have the hazards on.
First of all, that thumbnail of your face is the purest distilled essence of Jason I have ever seen.
Second, I feel this…
…to the deepest depths of my soul.
I like the RF interference suggestion, but I have a question: is the school bus nearby when this happens?
My suspicion is an induced signal in your speaker wiring from a digital radio signal – like the system many municipalities use to track the location and status of their school buses.
Probably there is a RF source nearby that interacts with your broken HU that is trying to boot and restarts.
What can it be? Many things.
You don’t know what people around is doing, but look for amateur radio antennas of sort. I know that some HOAs complain about them, so people are sometimes creative and hide them, using some amplifiers to allow them to do their job.
Just a guess.
I had a not quite similar issue with bluetooth. Whenever I changed the source to bluetooth audio the HU did a really loud pop sound. It happened with two Renaults that we owned. So maybe this is a feature, not a bug.
About the replacement for the HU, look in AliExpress, there will be tons of options, like this one with 360º cameras. There will cheaper options too. I don’t know about how the new US tariffs would impact the final price though.
Passenger airbag off? that’s some tough parenting?
With this car’s random electronics?
Besides, we’ve seen Jason and there’s probably more legroom in the seat behind him than in front.
It’s an old VW, do you really want the airbags working anyway?
That’s how I feel about my 1995 pickup. I don’t *want* the airbag to deploy, I think it would cause me more harm than good.
What happened to the Maroon Toyota that David T drove interstate to save you in the Tiguan from being pounded with coconuts.
Actually this could make a great Game and watch game.
It’s just a bass drum. Let us know when you start to hear cymbals and tom toms.